It’s been a year since SUCfree (Single Use Cup-free) Wanaka launched, and the project to rid Wanaka of single-use takeaway cups by 2022 is making good progress.

Wanaka now has nine entirely single-use cup free cafes, 24 with a cup-lending scheme or ‘cup libraries’, and so far it has saved an estimated 180,000 single use cups from landfill in the first year. 

The annual Wanaka A&P Show will also be single-use cup free next year.

SUCfree Wanaka member Chrissie Lahood described the group’s vision, which she hoped more individuals and cafes would support in its second year. 

“Imagine people talking about it, saying: ‘I’m visiting this cool little town and they don’t have any disposable cups at all’,” Chrissie said.

Everyone buying coffee or hot drinks would instead sit in, bring their own cups, or make use of cup-lending schemes that would operate in every cafe. 

SUCfree Wanaka has already saved about 180,000 single use cups from landfill.

“We want Wanaka people to get behind this vision,” she said.

Research undertaken during Plastic Free July showed SUCfree Wanaka wasn’t as well known as members hoped.

“We found out people hadn’t heard of it as a project: Too many people don’t know that we have got this vision to have a SUCfree Wanaka by 2022.”

In its second year, Chrissie said the group also aimed for wider awareness of the harm of disposable cups.

“There’s a lot of single-use cups now with misleading packaging. People think it’s compostable or it’s biodegradable, but there’s plastic in all of these cups - if there wasn’t plastic in them they would leak.”

Without a commercial composting system, these cups - labelled biodegradable or not - all end up in landfill. 

SUCFree Wanaka was formed following the 2018 WAO (formerly One Wanaka) Summit.

Chrissie said last Monday’s first birthday celebration was “small but meaningful”, with participating cafes and members reporting on their progress. 

Learn more about SUCfree Wanaka here.

PHOTOS: Supplied